Narrow Results

The following sections are included:

• From PhD Project to Nobel Prize
• Mössbauer Spectroscopy Spreads
• The Turn to Materials
• References

At the beginning of the 21st century, the largest projects in the US national laboratory system were devoted to materials science, signaling when this field, with its focus on practicality and industrial participation, was the top national research priority. By the same token, the fate and fortunes of the laboratory system were closely tied to materials science research, which encompassed widescale investigation into the properties of materials as well as the search for new commercial and medical material applications. However, the national laboratory system did not begin with a close connection to the investigation of materials. In the beginning, it was the World War II projects of radar and the atomic bomb that joined scientists, engineers, and military and industry officials. The success of these projects and wartime contacts led to abundant funding opportunities for a vast postwar research enterprise. Prewar and wartime institutions at Los Alamos, Chicago, and Berkeley were transformed into federally sponsored institutions, and new national laboratories were built…